Does academia benefit from online survey software?

Online survey software is widely regarded as business-oriented solution. This misconception probably has its roots in the fact that in a business context, survey software can be used in far more ways than just for research. But misconceptions aside, online surveys are used quite widely in the world of academia, as well. Usually online surveys are for anything ranging from peer-reviewed journal articles to working papers and conference papers. And, naturally, many students use online surveys to collect data for their Master’s and Bachelor’s theses.

Now that we’ve established the academic use of online surveys, you might be interested in knowing what exact topics are surveyed. It might come as no surprise that surveys are used in almost any field of science. We put together a short list of academic papers that have used online surveys as their primary data source. Oh, and just as it happens, all of these researchers used Webropol to gather the data.


A selection of academic papers

• External economies and strategic cooperation: structural equation modelling with Finnish data. World Review of Intermodal Transportation Research, Vol 2, No 4. Juntunen (2009) Link
• Views on the international market for energy biomass in 2020: results from a scenario study. International Journal of Energy Sector Management, Vol 2, Issue 4. Heinimo, Ojanen & Kassi (2008) Link
• Good Sources of Weak Signals: A Global Study of Where Futurists Look For Weak Signals. Journal of Futures Studies, May. Hiltunen (2008) Link
• Outreach and graduate programme in clinical dentistry. Proceedings of 34th annual Meeting of the Association for Dental Education in Europe. Le Bell & Vinkka-Puhakka (2008) Link
• Searching for e-mentoring practices for SME staff development. Services Business, Vol 3, No 2. Leppisaari & Tenhunen (2008) Link
• Link between contractually integrated retail entrepreneurs' working experience and their information gathering and interpreting styles. Information Research, Vol 13, No 4. Lindblom & Olkkonen (2008) Link
• Market-Sensing Capability and Business Performance of Retail Entrepreneurs. Contemporary Management Research, Vol 4, No 3. Lindblom, Olkkonen, Mitronen & Kajalo (2008) Link
• SMS-based human-hosted interactive tv in Finland. ACM International Conference Proceeding Series, Vol. 291. Tuomi (2008) Link
• Future images of meat consumption in 2030. Futures, Vol 41, Issue 5. Vinnari & Tapio (2008) Link
• Mobile learning – a new paradigm shift in distance education? Working papers, Athabasca University. Zawacki-Richter, Brown & Delport (2007a) Link
• Factors that may contribute to the establishment of mobile learning in institutions–Results from a survey. International Journal: Interactive Mobile Technologies, Issue 1. Zawacki-Richter, Brown & Delport (2007b) Link
• Organizational Measures Taken against Workplace Bullying: The Case of Finnish Municipalities. Working Papers 521, Hanken School of Economics. Salin (2006) Link

Phew. That was quite some list, wasn’t it? And that wasn’t even all – we just picked a set of twelwe for you to have a look at.

At this point it might come as no surprise that Webropol is quite popular within academia. In fact, our reference clients include Hanken School of Economics, Helsinki School of Economics, The Sibelius Academy, University of Gothenburg, and the University of Helsinki, just to name a few.

So to answer the question we asked at the beginning, does academia benefit from online survey software, we’re more than certain to say: yes it does.